Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases by Grenville Kleiser (my reading book .txt) 📖

id="id15126">By the sheer centripetal force of sympathy

By virtue of a common understanding

By way of rejoinder

C

Calculated to create disgust

Calm strength and constancy

Capable of a severe scientific treatment

Capacity for urbanity and moderation

Carried into port by fair winds

Caught unawares by a base impulse

Ceaseless tramp of humanity

Censured for his negligence

Championing the cause of religious education

Chastened and refined by experience

Checked by the voice of authority

Cherished the amiable illusion

Cherishing a huge fallacy

Childishly inaccurate and absurd

Chivalrous loyalty and high forbearance

Clever and captivating eloquence

Coarse and glittering ostentation

Coherent and continuous trend of thought

Commended by perfect suavity

Common ground of agreement

Complicated and infinitely embittered

Conceded from a sense of justice

Conceived with imperfect knowledge

Concentrated and implacable resolve

Conditions of unspeakable humiliation

Conducive to well-being and efficiency

Confused rumblings presaging a different epoch

Constrained by the sober exercise of judgment

Consumed by a demon of activity

Continuous and stubborn disregard

Contrary to the clearest conviction of his judgment

Couched in terms of feigned devotion

Credulous and emotionally extravagant

Creed of incredulity and derision

Criticized with unsparing vigor

Crude undigested masses of suggestion

Cruel and baseless calumnies [calumnies = maliciously false statements; slander]

Cynically repudiate all obligations

D

Daily usages and modes of thinking

Dangerously near snobbery

Darkly insinuating what may possibly happen

Dazzled by their novelty and brilliance

Debased by common use

Deep essentials of moral grandeur

Deeply engrossed in congenial work

Deeply moved as well as keenly stung

Deeply rooted in the heart of humanity

Defiant of analysis and rule

Degenerate into comparative feebleness

Degenerated into deadness and formality

Degrading and debasing curiosity

Deliberate and cautious reflection

Delicacy of perception and quick tact

Delude many minds into acquiescence

Dense to the point of stupidity

Descanting on them cursorily [descanting = discussion or discourse]

Devices generally held to be discreditable

Devious and perilous ways

Devoid of hysteria and extravagance

Dexterous modes of concealment

Dictated by an overweening partiality

Differ in degree only and not in kind

Difficult and abstruse questions [abstruse = incomprehensible ]

Diffidence overwhelmed him

Diffusing beneficent results

Dignified by deliberation and privacy

Dimly implying some sort of jest

Discreditable and insincere support

Disdaining the guidance of reason

Disenchanting effect of time and experience

Disfigured by glaring faults

Disguised in sentimental frippery

Dispel all anxious concern

Displayed enormous power and splendor

Distinguish themselves by their eccentricities

Distracted by contending desires

Diversity of mind and temperament

Divested of all personal feelings

Dogged and shameless beyond all precedent

Dominated by no prevailing taste or fashion

Doomed by inexorable fate

Doomed to impermanence and transiency

Draw back in distrust and misgiving

Dreaded and detested rival

Driven towards disaffection and violence

Due to historical perspective

Dull and trite commonplaces

Dwindled to alarmingly small dimensions

E

Easy-going to the point of lethargy

Elementary principles of right and wrong

Embittered and fanatical agitation

Encrusted with pedantry and prejudice [pedantry = attention to detail]

Endless and intricate technicalities

Endowed with undreamed-of powers

Enforced by coercive measures

Enormities of crime and anomalies of law

Entangled in theological controversy

Entirely futile and negligible

Erroneous assumptions and sophistries

Espoused with extraordinary ardor

Essentially one-sided and incomplete

Eternally fruitful and stimulating

Evidently malicious and adroit

Evinces a hardened conscience and an insensibility to shame

Exact and resolute allegiance

Examples of terrific and explosive energy

Exasperating to the last degree

Excruciating cruelty and injustice

Exposed to damaging criticism

Exposing his arrogance and folly to merited contempt

Expressions of unrestrained grief

Exquisite lucidity of statement

Extraordinarily subtle and penetrating analysis

Exuberant rush of words

F

Facile and fertile literary brains

Faithfully and religiously eschewed [eschew = avoid; shun]

Fallen into the convenient oblivion of the waste-basket

Fanatical and dangerous excesses

Far off and incredibly remote

Fastidious correctness of form

Fate had turned and twisted a thousand ways

Fed by many currents from the long stream of human experience

Feigning a virtuous indignation

Fertility of argumentative resource

Fictitious and adventitious aid

Finely touched to the fine issues

Fit to stand the gaze of millions

Fits and starts of generosity

Fixed convictions of mankind

Flouted as unpractical

Foolish and inflexible superstition

Fostering and preserving order

Free from all controversial pettifogging [pettifogging = quibbling over insignificant details]

Freighted with the most precious cargoes

Frequently recurring forms of awkwardness

Fresh and unsuspected loveliness

From the standpoint of expediency and effectiveness

Full and tuneful diction

Full of ardent affection and gratitude

Full of presentiments of some evil

Full of singular freshness, insight and power

Full of speculation and a deep restrained excitement

Fumble and stumble in helpless incapacity

G

Gain the applause of future ages

Generous to a pathetic and touching degree

Give vent to his indignation

Giving an ear to a little neighborly gossip

Glances and smiles of tacit contempt

Gnawing at the vitals of society

Grace and gentleness of manner

Graceful succession of sentences

Gratuitous and arbitrary meddling

Greeted with unalloyed satisfaction

Grooves of intellectual habit

Growing sense of bewilderment and dismay

Guilty and baffled antagonists

H

Habits of unintelligent routine

Habitual self-possession and self-respect

Happy and gracious willingness

Hard-souled and joyously joyous

Haunted by blank misgivings

He affected neither pomp nor grandeur

He became more blandly garrulous [garrulous = excessive and trivial talk]

He declined the proffered hospitality

He dropped into an eloquent silence

He eludes analysis and baffles description

He glanced at her indulgently

He had the habit of self-engrossed silences

He harbored his misgivings in silence

He poured bitter and biting ridicule on his discomfited opponents

He spoke with sledgehammer directness

He suffers nothing to draw him aside

He took his courage in both hands

He turned on me a glance of stored intelligence

He was disheveled and untidy

He was inexhaustibly voluble

Heavily freighted with erudition [erudition = extensive learning]

Heights of serene contemplation

Her voice had a wooden resonance and a ghost of a lisp

Hidebound in official pedantry [pedantry = attention to detail]

High and undiscouraged hope

High-handed indifference to all restraint

His chin had too vanishing an aspect

His first zeal was flagging

His general attitude suggested an idea that he had an oration for you

His gestures and his gait were untidy

His mood was one of pure exaltation

His plea was irresistible

His tone verged on the ironical

His work was ludicrously perfunctory

Hopelessly belated in its appearance

I

I adjured him [adjured = command or enjoin solemnly, as under oath]

I am not without a lurking suspicion

I bemoaned my unlucky fate

I could almost allege it as a supreme example

I have somewhat overshot the mark

I lost myself in a reverie of gratitude

I made bold to retort

I must hazard the story

I was extremely perplexed

I will permit myself the liberty of saying

I would fain believe [fain = happily; gladly]

Illuminate with sinister effect

Immediate and effectual steps

Immense capacity for ceaseless progress

Immunity from criticism and control

Impartial and exacting judgment

Impatience of despotic influence

Impelled by strong conviction

Imperiled in a restless age

Imperious in its demands [imperious = arrogantly domineering]

Impotent outbreaks of unreasoning rage

Impromptu parades of noisy patriotism

In a diversity of application

In a fever of apprehension

In a frenzy of fussy excitement

In a frowning abstraction

In a great and fruitful way

In a high degree culpable

In a kind of confused astonishment

In a most commendable fashion

In a most impressive vein

In a position of undisputed supremacy

In a rapture of imagined ecstasy

In a secret and surreptitious way [surreptitious = done by clandestine or stealthy means]

In a spirit of friendliness and conciliation

In a state of mulish reluctance [mulish = stubborn and intractable]

In a state of nervous exacerbation

In a state of virtuous complacency

In a tone of uneasy interrogation

In a transport of ambitious vanity

In a whirlwind of feeling and memory

In accents embarrassed and hesitating

In alliance with steady clearness of intellect

In amazed ejaculation

In an eminent and unique sense

In an eminent degree

In deference to a unanimous sentiment

In extenuation of the past

In high good humor

In his customary sententious fashion [sententious = terse and energetic; pithy]

In its most odious and intolerable shape

In language terse yet familiar

In moments of the most imminent peril

In quite incredible confusion

In seasons of difficulty and trial

In spite of plausible arguments

In terms of imperishable beauty

In the dim procession of years

In the highest conceivable degree

In the local phrase

In the nature of things

In the ordinarily accepted sense

In the realm of conjecture

In the scheme of things

In the tone of one who moralizes

In the twinkling of an eye

In the world of letters

In tones of genuine admiration

Incapable of flashy make-believe

Incited by a lust for gain

Incomparable lucidity and penetrativeness

Inconceivable clumsiness of organization

Indulge a train of gentle recollection

Indulging a sickly and nauseating petulance

Ineffably dreary and unpicturesque

Infected with a feverish dissatisfaction

Infuse a wholesome terror

Inimical to true and determined principle [Inimical = harmful; adverse]

Inimitable grace and felicity [inimitable = defying imitation; matchless]

Injudicious and inelegant ostentation

Innumerable and incessant creations

Inordinate greed and love of wealth

Insatiably greedy of recognition

Insensibility to moral perspective and proportion

Insolent and riotous excess

Inspired by a vague malevolence

Inspirited by approval and applause

Instances might be multiplied indefinitely

Instantly alive to the slightest breach of decorum

Insufferable violence to the feelings

Intense and stubborn dogmatism

Intense sensitiveness to injustice

Intercourse with polished society

Intervals of respite and repose

Inveigh against established customs [inveigh = angry disapproval; protest vehemently]

Invested with a partial authority

Inveterate forces of opposition

Invincible jealousy and hate

Involuntary thrill of gratified vanity

Involved in profound uncertainty

Involving ourselves in embarrassments

Inward appraisal and self-renouncement

Irregulated and desultory education [desultory = haphazard; random]

Irrelevant to the main issue

Irresistibly impelled by conscience

Irritable bitterness and angry suspicion

It assumes the shape of malignity

It betrays a great want of prudence and discernment

It defies description

It dissipates every doubt and scruple

It enslaves the imagination

It extorted from him expressions of irritability

It gives one a little grip at the throat

It has been stigmatized as irrelevant

It has more than passing interest

It has seldom been surpassed

It imposes no constraint

It is a capital blunder

It is a common error among ignorant people

It is a consoling reflection

It is a mark of great instability

It is a staggering thought

It is always something vicious

It is an odd jealousy

It is an intolerable idea

It is impossible to resist acknowledging this

It is little more than a